Millets

Millets mainstreaming in India, Asian and African countries

A compendium of field stories showcasing experiences from Asian and African countries, including India was launched. The compendium will help in capacity building and scaling up the best practices in the adoption of millets across the world. It also signifies the successful realization of the Mapping and Exchange of the …

Millet production to increase in Tamil Nadu

The State government is planning a number of initiatives, including roping in women in tribal areas, to increase the production of millet in Tamil Nadu. Sources told City Express that millet was produced in nearly 18 districts of the State, but now only a handful of them produce the crop. …

Food Security Bill could spark grain crisis: Gulati

With the revised National Food Security Bill set to be introduced in Parliament, the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) has warned the government's move to distribute highly subsidised foodgrains to two-thirds of the population as a legal entitlement that would create a serious crisis of ‘food management’in the …

Adopt SRI, save resources

SRI practice which originated in Madagascar, is spreading far and wide as farmers are finding it beneficial. There are innovations being tried out in different soil conditions too. For example, farmers of Sindanur taluk in Karnataka with black cotton soils sow 5 kgs paddy mixed with 20 kgs of fine …

Plant perennials to save Africa's soils

Integrating perennials with food crops could restore soil health and increase staple yields, say Jerry D. Glover, John P. Reganold and Cindy M. Cox.

Include millets in noon meal, States told

Apart from increasing nutrition of schoolchildren, the move will help to boost production The Agriculture Ministry has asked the States to include millets in the mid-day meal scheme to increase the demand for the cereal and, thereby, enhance farm incomes.Millet crops or coarse cereals are known for their high nutritional …

Agricultural research in India: An exploratory study

Agriculture is the backbone of the Indian economy which plays the most decisive role in the socioeconomic development of the country. Indian agriculture is a miscellaneous and extensive sector involving a large number of actors. India has one of the largest and institutionally most complex agricultural research systems in the …

Bringing culture back: Traditional agricultural knowledge, food production and sustainable livelihood among Chuktia Bhunjia of Orissa

This article deals with how Chuktia Bhunjia tribe of Orissa negotiates with their ecosystem to ensure that agricultural production and livelihood are sustainable. This study shows that the reasons behind continuation of traditional agriculture are the life experience with the traditional methods and cultural acceptance that not only make them …

Bangalore goes bananas over millets

The Marigowda Memorial Hall in Lalbagh, Bangalore witnessed a steady footfall of 100 to 200 people at any given time on the 13th, 14th and 15th of April. The occasion being ‘The Millet Mela’ that introduced Bangaloreans to an incredible range of millets and their lip smacking derivatives. Earth360, pioneered, …

Decentralised procurement and universalised PDS

Decentralisation of food procurement could facilitate universalisation of the public distribution system under the proposed National Food Security Act. Non-green revolution crops such as millets, coarse cereals, pulses, oilseeds, etc, should also be covered in the PDS.

Revival of the public distribution system: Evidence and explanations

Contrary to a common belief that India’s public distribution system is irreparably dysfunctional, a nine-state survey of the pds finds that the respondents received 84-88% of their full entitlement. The implicit subsidy for households below the poverty line from pds foodgrains alone is roughly equivalent, in many states, to a …

3 taluks turn bone-dry

Kolar, Bangarpet, Srinivaspur among 70 drought-hit taluks in the State The State government has declared Kolar, Malur and Bangarpet taluks drought-hit. The scanty rainfall is estimated to cause huge crop loss in the district. Ragi sown prior to the monsoon is in the stage of developing ears. However, lack of …

Bamboo flowering in AP

Itanagar: Farmers of several villages in Chayang Tajo and Sawa circles under East Kameng district of Arunachal Pradesh are spending sleepless nights following bamboo flowering on a large scale. According to official sources here on Thursday, flowering of taffo (a sub-Himalayan species of dwarf bamboo) is spreading thick and fast …

Neglected no more

With less than one percent of the world’s area, Nepal is home to a disproportionately large number of plant species. Yet large numbers of the population are food insecure, and hunger and malnutrition are prevalent. Statistics show that the situation has worsened during the past two decades. The worst-affected segments …

Maize Mania

In the lush forested uplands of Koraput, Domu Matpadia, a Paraja tribeswoman, is coming face to face with modern farm technology. A representative of Charoen Pokphand, a Thai agribusiness multinational, is telling her how to grow its hybrid maize seeds that the state government has given her free along with …

Maize Mania

Maize has become the queen of cereals, courted by state governments, seed companies, farmers and the feedstock and starch industries as the crop of the future. The golden promise of hybrid maize with its high productivity and high returns is luring farmers across the country. But this triumphal march is …

Letter to Andhra Pradesh CM from the Millet Network of India

Letter to Andhra Pradesh CM from the Millet Network of India on the government's decision to provide an input subsidy for maize farmers to a tune of Rs.5000 per acre.        

Over 90,000 tonnes seed certified

COIMBATORE: The Department of Organic and Seed Certification has certified 93,552 tonnes seed from the paddy, millets, pulses, cotton, oil seeds and vegetable varieties. The purpose behind certifying the seeds was to convey to the farmers that they could be assured of the purity of the seeds, the department said …

Selection for earlier flowering crop associated with climatic variations in the Sahel

Climate changes will have an impact on food production and will require costly adaptive responses. Adapting to a changing environment will be particularly challenging in sub-Saharan Africa where climate change is expected to have a major impact. However, one important phenomenon that is often overlooked and is poorly documented is …

Adapting livestock water productivity to climate change

The main purposes of this paper were to assess effects of smallholder farmers access to livelihood capital (e.g. land, livestock and water) on livestock water productivity (LWP) and to evaluate impacts of selected interventions in reducing livestock water demand (per unit of livestock product) and therefore increasing LWP.

India set to grow biofortified crop

INDIA will soon be the first country to commercially cultivate biofortified pearl millet, or bajra. The crop has been biofortified to improve its iron and zinc nutrients, and will be released in 2012 by HarvestPlus, a global alliance of research and implementing agencies. To be distributed in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat …

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